


One Final Visit

by lightning_troubadour



Category: Corpse Bride (2005)
Genre: Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-10
Updated: 2016-07-10
Packaged: 2018-07-22 18:01:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7448899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lightning_troubadour/pseuds/lightning_troubadour
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A few years after the strange occurrences leading up to the Van Dorts' marriage, Victoria Van Dort thinks she hears an intruder in the house. Instead, she finds the one person she thought she would never see again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One Final Visit

Another foggy day turned into another stormy night in the town where the Van Dort family lived, the moon occasionally peaking out through the clouds like a small child playing hide and seek, peeking out from her hiding place to make sure the seeker is not near. Victor had become a heavy sleeper in the years after what he and his wife dubbed "The Happy Accident," a habit he had become grateful for since he remembered stirring at every small sound as a young man. However, Victoria Van Dort found that for once, she was the one could not sleep at all. 

"It's just the thunder keeping you awake," she insisted to herself, "merely the storm." But deep in her heart, she knew that this was not the case, having slept through storms much worse than the current one. Then, almost like in a dream, she heard the faintest playing of the piano downstairs. It was a distant melody, and a familiar one too. But Victor was asleep, that she knew by his sporadic snoring, and she doubted their five year-old daughter would be this adept at playing. So against her better judgement, Victora slowly crept out of bed, put on her housecoat, and slipped the small pistol Victor kept in the bedroom in case of a robbery into the nightgown's pocket. Slowly, she crept down the stairs, the faint melody of the piano getting louder until she found the source. There, sitting on the piano bench, was the eerie figure of a white-clad woman she had never seen before.

The ethereal woman's ash blonde hair fell down her back, while she wore a plain white dress similar to the type of nightgown Victoria's mother once wore. Victoria quickly pulled out the pistol and hissed in a whisper, "Who is that? Turn around at once or face very dire consequences!" When the woman turned, Victoria realized at once that there was only one person it could be. "E-Emily?" she said, voice shaking at the thought that the Corpse Bride, the town's biggest urban legend, had returned from whatever great beyond she went to all those years ago to visit her family once more.   
"Hello, Victoria. Or, do you prefer Mrs. Van Dort now?" Emily smiled at her, her face pale, but whole. Her skin was not tinted blue with death, nor was it rotted away. Her eyes, gray in color, were not jaundiced or inhabited by maggots. Her appearance would have been completely normal to someone who hadn't remembered her as a decomposed, bug-addled corpse. 

Victoria slowly put the pistol down, hands shaking. "Emily, by God, what brings you here? How did you get here anyway?"   
"Shhh, not so loud, silly. Wouldn't want to wake your husband, would you?" the dead woman giggled. Emily patted the spot next to her on the piano bench, asking, "Won't you sit and chat for a spell?"   
The living woman, though hesitant, decided that Emily, who was always good natured, had no reason to hurt her, so took a seat next to her. "So, erm, as I was saying, what brings you here?"   
"Well," Emily softly said, "I was allowed one visit to Earth, and I decided to save it. I figured now would be a good time as ever, so here I am!"   
"Wouldn't you want to visit during the day when we're all awake, though? To see Victor again, and see how we're doing?", Victoria asked.  
Emily turned to her companion and said, "And there's the catch. Have you ever noticed in ghost stories that the living are never visited by the dead during the daytime?" She received a nod in reply. "Well, there's a reason for that. We are only allowed to come down for our one visit at night for Heaven knows what reason. I guess the line between the living and the dead must be temporal as well as physical."   
"So, I guess you're here to find out if we've been alright, huh?" Victoria asked the ghostly woman.   
"Yes, actually. Couldn't have said it better myself. How are things? Is Victor alright? Any children yet?" the spirit asked.   
"Victor and I inherited his family's fish market, and though we aren't as affluent as I remember my family was in my youth, we're quite well off I'd say. He's been able to hire more employees, really expand it." She looked up at Emily: "And about your other question, yes. One, a little girl. And guess what we named her." 

Emily's eyes widened in surprise, and tears began to well up in them. "You don't mean-"   
"I do," Victoria swiftly replied with a gentle smile. "Our little Emily Van Dort. Who else could we name her after besides the woman who saved my life and brought us together?"   
A tear rolled down Emily's pale, semi-transparent cheek as she asked, "Saved your life? H-how exactly did I do that?"  
"If you and Victor hadn't decided to have your wedding day on the same day as mine and Lord Barkis', and had you not confronted him, Barkis surely would have..." She paused. "He would have killed me just like-"   
"Just like he did to me." Emily sighed. "Might I be honest with you, Victoria?" the spirit asked, tilting her head slightly.   
"Yes, of course, anything."   
"I just wish that, instead of the wine, that I was the one to kill Barkis, that horrible...bastard." Emily swiftly covered her mouth with her hand. "Oh dear, I truly do beg your pardon, some words, they just-"   
Victoria placed her hand on her companion's shoulder, saying, "It's fine, dear. Believe me, that word doesn't even begin to describe him; the fact that he could murder someone so wonderful, so full of life and love as you with no remorse, then plan to do the same to me, why that sickens me beyond any word's description. Now it is my time to beg your pardon, Emily, because I must know, is it true that you were only sixteen?"   
Emily sighed and looked down. "No, I had just turned seventeen a week before."   
"Oh God, oh my God," Victoria said, covering her mouth with her hand in shock. "You poor dear, you deserved so much better...Only seventeen...Oh, God..."   
Her ghostly companion smiled and said, "Victoria, dear, don't mourn the dead. I came here from a better place, and even before I was set free the land of the dead was one of the most extraordinary and, dare I say, lively places I had ever been to. I was destined to die, just like you were destined to marry Victor and have your little girl. Some things, we just can't control. Besides, it isn't all bad."   
"How so?" Victoria asked softly.   
Emily replied, with the most earnest look, "Had I not died, I would have been your mother's age by now, and I never would have met Victor, never would have learned what love really is, and, well, I never would have spoken to you tonight. It is quite nice to finally formally meet the woman Victor loved so much." 

Suddenly, a small voice was heard from the top of the stairs. "Mummy? Who are you talking to?"   
Victoria turned to look at her small daughter, with eyes like ravens' feathers and hair like sable, and turned back to look at the elder Emily, who was now out of sight, possibly forever. She rushed to her daughter and said, "Emily, sweetling, can you keep a secret for Mummy?" The girl nodded. Victoria knelt down to reach her daughter's height and said, "Mummy was talking to your guardian angel. Now, don't tell Daddy I told you this, or anyone. This needs to stay our little secret."   
"Why?" The little girl asked, as children often do.   
Victoria Van Dort slowly sighed, scooped up her daughter in her arms, and said, "I'll tell you the whole story someday, sweetling. Now let's go off to bed. 

After tucking her daughter back in, hurrying downstairs to retrieve the pistol, and returning the unneeded weapon to the wooden box it was kept in, Victoria returned to bed and settled in next to Victor, who didn't stir a bit. She knew one day she would tell her daughter the story of Emily the Corpse Bride, her namesake, her guardian angel, but for now she drifted off to sleep, her mind at rest and her heart relieved.

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everyone! So I was just really inspired by the idea of Emily and Victoria finally interacting after all the commotion of the events of the movie, since we never see them interact in any real way. And, might I add, this is the first fic I've ever written, so if you could please tell me what you think and what I need to improve upon in whatever I write next, it would mean a lot to me. Thanks in advance, I hope you enjoyed the story!


End file.
